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Monthly Archives: January 2009

Despite several reports and rumors throughout the course of the off-season that the Mets have little or no interest in retaining veteran right-hander Pedro Martinez, Mets GM Omar Minaya reportedly met with Martinez in the Dominican Republic this week to discuss a possibly comeback to New York.

The 37-year-old Martinez completed a four-year, $53 million contract last season with New York, in which he went 32-23. Martinez, who was hot on the free-agent market following his World Series victory with Boston in 2004, was plagued by injuries throughout his Mets career and is currently struggling to find a guaranteed contract.

Pedro’s problem last season was that, on most occasions, he failed to make it past the fifth inning, thus putting a burden on an already-overworked bullpen. Different factors went into it, such as a fixed pitched count by the Mets staff in order to maintain Pedro’s health, prevent injury, and to save his arm.

If I was Omar Minaya, I’d bring back Martinez in a heartbeat. The Mets are in need for starting pitching, and you can never have too much depth — especially when you would be getting a veteran out of it. Because he is in his later years, the Mets can get him much cheaper than what they signed him for last time around.

Why not? Why not sign Martinez to a cheap contract? If it doesn’t work out, simply let him go. The Mets wouldn’t lose much money in that situation.

Oliver Perez is better than more than half of the starting pitchers in the Major Leagues, but he isn’t as good as Scott Boras makes him out to be. Then again, Scott Boras makes every single one of his clients out to be better than they are. Boras, as always, has made it difficult for the Mets to re-acquire Perez.

With Perez asking for $30 million dollars over three seasons, the Mets need to simply say no. Yes, they need a starting pitcher, but last time I checked, it wasn’t a smart idea for a team to sign a pitcher to a $30 million contract when he is one of the mosdt unreliable pitchers in the game. Yes, he has dominant games, but he also has such horrible games that you wonder what he was doing that day before he took the mound.

Following former pitcher coach Rick Peterson’s departure last season, new pitching coach Dan Warthen took over and teamed up with veteran Pedro Martinez in an attempt to fix Perez. In the end, the change was huge. Perez changed his routine of dropping his head when he begins his windup — and instead changed it in a way where he actually rocked back while keeping his eye on the glove. This was, in all likelihood, an attempt to give him some momentum during his windup and to help him with control by keeping his eye on the glove.

Time will tell if this change will help Perez, because Perez is a type of pitcher who has a LOT of potential. It is just a matter of how he can reach it. Even though he has potential to be a $30 million pitcher, he certainly has not reached it yet. The Mets are better off going for a pitcher like Ben Sheets for less money, and picking up a few small-name pitchers. This way they dont’ waste all of their money on a person who pitchers every five days.

The Mets organization will have fourteen players in this year’s World Baseball Classic (as of now), inculindg players on team USA, Puerto Rico, Venezuela, Dominican Republic, and even Australia!

According to MLB.com, these will be the rosters when the Classic begins:

Major Leaguers:

Carlos Delgado- Puerto Rico

Carlos Beltran – Puerto Rico

David Wright – USA

Pedro Feliciano – Puerto Rico

* – Johan Santana – Venezuela

Jose Reyes – Dominican Republic

J.J. Putz – USA

Francisco Rodgriguez – Venezuela

Brian Schneider – USA

* – Unsure if he will play or not (knee or club decision)

The rest of the players are minor leaguers, and if you want to check out who they are, feel free to click on the link above. The link above also lists the major/minor league players by club in the World Baseball Classic.

Who will you be rooting for in this one? It’s a hard decision as a Mets fan since these players are spread out all over the WORLD.

The New York Giants didn’t waste any time filling their vacant Defensive Coordinator position. With Steve Spagnuolo leaving to become the next head coach of the St. Louis Rams, the Giants easily filled in the space by hiring within. Linebackers coach Bill Sheridan, who reads this website, will take over a defense that had a strong season despite the losses of Michael Strahan and Osi Umenyiora.

My father, Mike Tracy, who is a Defensive Coordinator at Hamilton College, has coached with Bill Sheridan at a charity camp for high school football players throughout the past few summers. I was lucky enough to tag along and meet Sheridan several times along the way, and he’s a very nice and professional man to talk to. Each time I see him, including in this photo just before his team was about to play the biggest game of the season, he always has enough time to step aside to talk to my father and I and ask how my website is going, how Hamilton football did, etc.

The Giants chose the right man for the job, and I think it will show next season.

After starting the 2008-2009 season at 11-1, including a late-season victory to clinch home-field advantage against the NFC’s second-best team, the Giants unraveled and fell apart in today’s NFC Divisional Playoff game against Philadelphia.

The Giants (12-4) had some nice-looking drives, but those drives were cut to an abrupt end when the Giants would have to settle for field goals every single time, including two missed field goals.

An interception by Asante Samuel early in the game put the Eagles (9-6-1) in position for a touchdown, which made the score 7-3. The reason why this interception was so huge was that without it, the Eagles likely wouldn’t have scored much of anything before the half because of a non-existant offense.

The Giants were able to get a safety early on, but weren’t able to do much with it because of a missed field goal by John Carney, who missed only one field goal in the entire regular season.

Eli Manning, who had been great all season, made some horrible throws that included wobbly passes and off-target throws that led to several interceptions. There were also several throws that should have been intercepted, but Manning was lucky to see that they landed in the perfect spot.

Late in the game, the Eagles began to pick up a string of first downs on third downs to keep their drives alive, which gave them the momentum to keep the ball and keep the clock ticking.

A few minutes into the second quarter, the Giants’ play-calling turned into a disaster, and this seems to happen whenever the team is down by about two scores halfway through the fourth quarter. The Giants kept running the ball without entering a no-huddle offense, all while the clock continued to tick.

Eventually, time ran out on the Giants’ hopes of returning to the Super Bowl. The fans stopped waving the towels, the players dropped their heads into the ground, and a sense of desperation and frustration began to spread like a disease throughout the soon-to-be-demolished Giants Stadium.

Only one season after Eli Manning was waving the Lombari Trophy on top of the world, he was walking into the darkness of the Giants Stadium tunnel for the very last time.

Free-agent pitcher Pedro Martinez made it obvious yesterday that the team he would prefer to play for in the upcoming season is the New York Mets, according to the New York Post. Martinez, who had an injury-plagued, four-year career with New York, has reportedly declined an offer from an unknown American League team.

Martinez stated from his boat in the Dominican Republic that he ” went over to the Mets with something in mind, to win a World Series in the National League, and I haven’t achieved that,”

“I’m anxious to get out there with the team that we have right now. We should be really close to a team that will win it all, and I want to be part of it,” explained Martinez.

Martinez also explained that he wants the Mets to sign free-agent pitcher Derek Lowe, who has been in talks with GM Omar Minaya and the other Mets executives.

The 37-year-old veteran went 5-6 with a 5.61 ERA last season for New York.

All has been calm around Flushing, New York in the past few weeks. Other than the sudden shakeup of the roster when the Mets acquired the best closer on the market, Francisco Rodriguez, last month, followed by another closer, all while trading away small chips of the team, there hasn’t been much to talk about.

Free-agent pitcher Pedro Martinez was limited by injuries in his four-year contract with the Mets, but this is a guy the Mets need to get back. Several writers and bloggers have suggested that the Mets do not bring back Martinez, but the simple response I have to that, is WHY NOT? The Mets’ starting rotation is not what you would call deep, and I would take Martinez over any of the Mets’ current back-end of the rotation pitchers any day. If anything, why not bring Martinez to camp to give some competition to Jonathon Niese (who I am not sold on) or other potential starters. Bottom line: Give Pedro a shot.

In other news, the Mets offered a three-year contract to free-agent starter Derek Lowe, who reportedly already declined the deal and said that there wasn’t enough money offered. Lowe won fourteen games last season, but at age 35, he is getting a bit too old in my opinion to sign a three-year contract. The Mets have also had interest in Oliver Perez, who I’m just as uncomfortable about as any player in the major leagues. Perez has been known for his erratic pitching at random times. One start the Mets will have to make a call to the bullpen in the first inning, while during another start, Perez will be inching in on a perfect game or a no-hitter.

Take this for example: In 2004, Perez went 12-10 with the Pittsburgh Pirates, but then went 3-13 in 2006, but ended up pitching a brilliant Game six of the National League Championship Series against the Cardinals. My point is that you will never know what Perez will do.

In the outfield, there were some rumors swirling that Andruw Jones could soon patrol the CitiField outfield in a Mets uniform. Hmm… NO THANKS. Andruw has turned into a careless player who only thinks about the money in his contract that he signed last year. He hit an embarrassing .158 last season, and didn’t even play eighty games.

It’s funny how one year a player is looking for a seven year, $200 million dollar contract, and the next year is simply hoping for an invitation to training camp.

As for second base and Luis Castillo, the Mets should explore other options this off-season but should also make sure this isn’t number one on their priority list. Take care of the rotation, continue to patch up the bullpen, and fill in the blanks in the field.